Title

Author

Date of Award

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

English

First Advisor

Gian S. Pagnucci, Ph.D.

Second Advisor

Gloria G. Park, Ph.D.

Third Advisor

Sharon K. Deckert, Ph.D.

Abstract

This pedagogical study explored the usage of graphic novels among three, college English instructors at various institutions in the state of Pennsylvania. All three participants were faculty members of their respective institutions and were interviewed, had their classes observed by the researcher, and had content analysis conducted on all original documents produced and distributed by the instructor. The pedagogical study, which was a modified cross-case analysis, looked to explore (1) how the instructors literally taught their English courses using graphic novels and (2) how their past experiences and perceptions of the medium of graphic novels affected their textual choices and subsequent pedagogies. Analysis of the data showed that the participants in the study taught using graphic novels in a way that emphasized the literal reading of multimodal texts and analyzing said texts through a thematic lens. Additionally, the data also showed that while all of the participants personally found graphic novels to be academically valuable, they cited issues of student apprehension towards the reading of the texts and issues of access to certain graphic novels being problematic to the implementation of graphic novels in a college English course. Additionally, the assignments they required of students to complete reflected which particular element of graphic novels they found valuable in a college English class.

Recommended Citation

Romagnoli, Alex Scott, "Comics in the Classroom: A Pedagogical Exploration of College English Teachers Using Graphic Novels" (2014). Theses and Dissertations (All). 745.
https://knowledge.library.iup.edu/etd/745